Happy Birthday Dad!!!

 Today we celebrate the birth of my Dad!

I generally don't divulge ages.

But this one is a milestone.

He's   NINETY  y'all!

Sondra made him an old fashioned (classic?)

Pineapple Upside Down Cake!

It was DELICIOUS!

We had a birthday dinner for him at Kurt and Michelle's

beautiful new house.

He got a set of drums and enjoys playing with Mom

every morning. Gets the blood going!

While we were out there this past week we got

to put on a concert (HA!) with them!

We were GOOD!

(HA!)

But we sure had fun!!!

My Dad has always known how to have fun.

In his quiet, reserved way.

Aunt Karen sent him a stack of birthday presents.

One for him to open each day of his 

birthday week.

Lucky duck!

They were all fun and thoughtful and he had a blast

opening them and sometimes eating them,

or reading them, or wearing them...

Dad has always had a great love for his family.

Especially his wife.

He is an inspiration.

An example of a life continually well lived.

Of a gentle, iron soul.

Humility, thoughtful compassion and joy

are the three traits that instantly come

to mind when I think of my Dad.

Happy Birthday Dad!

Here's to MANY MANY more!

WE LOVE YOU!

GREAT TRIP!!!

 We had a terrific trip to Tucson!!!

There was LOTS of family together time!

(Lots of it around a table... lol)

I kind of felt bad for the other people in the restaurant

with us - we were having a VERY GOOD TIME!

(Mostly they were in the next room though...)

We were missing Reid!

He and Nancy got a REALLY bad cold/virus/thing

(RSV - NOT Covid) from their grands.

She got over it but he was still having a tough time.

Rod got to come this time!!!

It's been a good long while since he

got to fly away for a vacation.

And I was super happy to have him!

(This is at McDonald's at the Orlando Airport...

we got there early enough for breakfast and

a wander around the place before we hopped

on our plane and headed to Phoenix!)

The plan was to fly into Phoenix, pick up the

rental car, then pick up Sondra and drive to

Pine Top to meet the rest of the family.

But (see above) poor Nancy and Reid were

SO sick, we decided that might not be a

great plan - so we hopped in the car

and headed down to Tucson instead.

There was NO food at the airport (unless you

had gone through security) so we drove to

Casa Grande and Sondra recommended an

In-N-Out burger.

YUM!

It was really delicious!

Then on the rest of the way down to Tucson.

We headed straight to Mom and Dad's where

Mom had a delicious dinner of tacos and

homemade peach cobbler all ready and waiting.

By the time dinner rolled around, those 

burgers were a distant memory so the tacos

VERY welcome!

After a good visit (Rozann came by after she got

off of work) we headed to Nancy's. We were all

going to stay in the casita there.

Soni was in the guest room and Rod and I

were in the master.

What a GREAT casita!

Decorated so tastefully and yet still so comfortable.

You didn't feel like you couldn't kick back.

And of course there was a beautiful platter full

of fruits and breads waiting for us.

Nancy came by (all carefully masked up) and

bid us hello and goodnight.

Poor thing - she had SUCH a bad cough!

Then it was off to BED!

On Our Way!

 I just finished my final class for the week...

and now I'm going to go finish packing...

and then it's off to bed.

So we can get an early start tomorrow!

We are HOPPING ON A PLANE!!!

See you guys sometime in the afternoon!

(After we pick up Sondra... our flight gets in 

about 9 in the morning and she gets in

around noon - so we'll grab our rental Jeep

and once she lands we'll head SOUTH!)

Can't wait to see everybody!

Drop and Give Me 3

 I was listening to the Trim Healthy podcast

this morning while cleaning out the stock trailer.

(We took the last cow up to the butcher yesterday...

he made a MESS in there...)

Anyhow.

She was talking about a really interesting concept.

She and her husband got stuck in the Dallas Airport

for THREE days!

(Ugh, please don't let that happen to us.....)

Anyhow.

Everywhere around them were people who were

falling apart. Terrible language, sniping at each other,

yelling at the poor customer service people

who totally didn't deserve it...

Every time she felt herself wanting to get grumpy,

frustrated, snippy, etc...

she told herself...

DROP and GIVE ME THREE!

(things to be GRATEFUL for...)

I thought that was a terrific concept.

A good opportunity to look around and say,

Yup, things aren't going great right now,

but there are still at least THREE things I

can be grateful for in this very minute.

So, I HOPE I don't get a chance to test it out

this week while we do lots of flying...

but there are everyday little frustrations I am

going to give it a try on.

*****************************************************************

Bye Little Red!

We loaded him up Sunday morning for his final ride.

It was time!

Saturday he broke a board on the pasture fence and

let himself out into the "alley" between us and

Brock's pasture next door.

He can't get off the property, but he CAN get into the

new sunn hemp pasture!

Luckily there was lots of fresh green grass to tempt him

and he never made it back into the back back.

Beau was "helping" me round him up and put

him back where he belongs.

Also luckily the three little guys who usually stick

to him like glue stayed on their side of the fence

so I didn't have to round them ALL up.

Sunday morning they gave us some minor trouble

getting into the trailer - little Spot wanted to go

into the alleyway in the facility (which leads to the TRAILER)

and would NOT get out of the way so we could load Red.

Eventually Kyle got it all sorted out, Red loaded up

and we were on our way.

He was all alone in the pen at Braddock's.

There were hogs in the next two pens and a couple

of steers in the furthest away pen.

They moooed at each other for a bit.

We brought him a big ol' pile of hay so I'm

sure he eventually went over to eat it.

Kyle showed him how to get water from the

automatic water spigot thingie...

On the way home we stopped at a GIANT dealership in Daytona

to see about buying Kyle a new truck.

The website said they had a large selection.

When we got there, they didn't actually have ANY!

This one was already sold.

Waiting for the salesman.

No go.

Bummer!

He really needs a new truck.

His has around 400,000 miles give or take a couple.

He really needs something bigger, stronger, newer...

Guess he'll have to wait a little bit longer.

The guys are out doing THREE jobs today.

And I spent the day running errands.

Returns mostly.

Counting down the minutes!!!!!!!!!!

MEAT!!!

 So Much Meat!

(All loaded up in the UHaul we rented for the trip...)

We drove up to our meat processor.

(sounds better than slaughter house...)

They are SUCH nice people.

An old family business.

The lady who ran the business passed away.

The one who took over for her and who we 

worked with for the past couple of years

just retired in June.

The son (66) who has stepped into the

position of chief butcher hired his wife

to take over the back office.

She is REALLY organized.

And really nice.

They had it all nicely boxed and identified.

All we did was unload it into the kitchen,

weigh the boxes (so we knew we were giving

everybody the # we had promised... never

want to under deliver!)

And then wait for folks to come and get it!

(We had already dropped one share off on

the way back home, so if you add the 130 pounds

on that one, that's 1007 pounds of fresh,

backyard, homegrown, grain fed beef.

YUM!

This was mid-delivery.

Our's is in our chest freezer,

and we have 2 more quarters in our spare

freezers in the tack room waiting for

their people to come get them tomorrow.

Sunday we get to start the process all over again.

We are running our final steer up to "freezer camp"

and will go back to pick up the boxes in a couple

of weeks.

And then it's just... watch the little guys grow!

Eat up guys!

Pasture Update

Remember the back back pasture Kyle tilled?

Here you go. 

A little visual reminder.

Here is what it is looking like these days.

(Kyle had to build a road because his equipment

barn is off to the left...)

(That's our OLD red Ford pickup way in the back...)

What's a farmer's field without an old truck???

The sunn hemp is doing GREAT!

Speaking of doing great...

check out all the sweet potatoes!

We just grew them for the pretty green vines 

on the tunnel.

But look at the potatoes popping up!

I guess we need to read up on what

to do with them.

I know when you harvest them you have

to lay them out to dry.

Wonder where/how we are supposed to do that.

It's been raining each afternoon.

I guess we could lay them out in the tack room...

(If we put them in the garage the dogs will

assume they are TOYS!)

Anyhow.

Looking good out there!

New Tools!

 SEVERAL years ago, I "retired".

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!

Ok, now that we got THAT out of the way...

My wonderful Arizona family gave

me a terrific retirement gift.

And I have USED it.

To death.

Literally.

This week my beloved Surface Pro has been throwing an 

"insufficient power" (or something) error.

"We recommend you close some of your apps."

(Except the only app open was my Zoom.)

These error messages showed up in the middle of my zooms.

(multiple times...)

(And sometimes I would glance over to my iPad

to see my face frozen... cute!)

I have been crossing my fingers, toes, eyes,

that it didn't die in the middle of a zoom.

In the busiest week EVER.

Thursday night I hopped online and found 

a great price on a replacement.

And because I have LOVED my Surface Pro,

I got another one!

Just like it!

Only new.

My keyboard and pen work with it,

so I just needed a new tablet.

I spent the morning (after Zoom church - we

are back to masking, etc... and with the trip 

coming up in the next couple of weeks I decided 

to stay home and watch from here...)

I moved everything from the old tablet over

to the new tablet.

And backed it all up on a flash drive just for fun.

It looks like I'm launching the space shuttle!

Hahahaha.

(With super cute astronauts...)

I'll keep the old tablet.

I'll bring it with me on vacation so I can still blog.

And workout. (hahahaha)

But for the most part it will be retired.

(HA! We all know how THAT works out!)

Anyhow.

I have been SO thankful for my gift.

And was equally gratefully it didn't suffer an

untimely death.

And the new one came in time.

And I could figure out how to move everything.

And now?

LUNCH!

****************************************************************

COUNTDOWN

10 "SLEEPS" UNTIL THE BIG VACATION!